BLOOD LANDx2000My magnum opus received a rejection today, not for publication, but rather, that it was not qualified for a review by any “reviewers” on the website The New Podler Review of Books: Small Press and self-published books worth reading”. Now I don’t remember ever submitting a review request to this site, although it’s possible. I don’t normally ask for reviews except when I am just putting a book out there and need a few ARC reviews posted so that the almighty ad sites will consider my money worth spending (and then I normally impose shamelessly on fellow authors).

Now the facts that the aforementioned review site is built on the most hideous of the free backdrops on the free “blogspot.com” and that my rejection came from a (free) Gmail address notwithstanding, their subtitle would suggest that my self-published book is “[not] worth reading”. Now had the site just said “Podler Reviews” I probably wouldn’t have given it a second glance. Okay, that AND if the current book under review didn’t have a cover (and writing) quality equivalent to that of a sixth-grader (no, that’s not true—not true at all. Such a commentary insults the sixth-grader).

I know, we’re supposed to have thick skin. And I usually do. Or pretend I do. But just as each time a reader enjoys my work it makes my day, not matter how many books I ever sell or have reviewed, it also stings when someone takes time out of their day to reject you. Doesn’t it? Or am I alone here, wandering in the literary desert of criticism with eyes gouged out and a bloody wrap around my head? It’s a bummer when people that consider dog poop as literature reject you as unreadable. I know, I know, it actually defies logic, but what can I say?

Oh, and I also realize I’m giving them voice by writing about them. The funny thing is, I don’t have anything personal against them. I like helping people. I gave the last $5 in my wallet to a homeless man sitting on a sleeping bag downtown yesterday. I’d have given it to him if it was a twenty. I wish it HAD been a twenty. I try my damndest to equally promote other Indies along with myself, plus add in inspirational quotes, whether my own or someone much more famous, and last week @JustinJWilliams tweeted to me:

 

JustinJWilliamsTweet2

 

tumblr_m9dli3keMg1rvtq76o1_500Of course I checked him out and this chowderhead uses Twitter as a chat program so we all get to experience how witty he is (I’ll admit, a pile of “original” content, though every time some wandering beast takes a dump we wind up with the same thing, “value” being in the anus of the beholder, I suppose). Whatever. It was far from an arrow to The Great Smaug’s underbelly of armor (no, I’m not implying my writing anything that terrorizes the earth, and since some of you may not have read The Hobbit, I suppose this is all one big egotistic analogy AND plot spoiler—in my defense, yesterday I was having my own pile of a TGIF).

INKvNEWOh, and a book advertising site declined INK: Eight Rules To A Better Book, at first based on its length being only 104 pages (I was trying to advertise in the “How-To” section; they wanted 50,000 words or more—can you imagine a 50K tome on “How to Change Your Oil”?. When I showed them several examples of books much shorter than mine, one on sniffing wine corks, they responded that they “make exceptions” but the “editorial staff” did not find my book “worthy of exception”. They also mentioned that they don’t always have the time to read every submission, so they take many factors into consideration upon review, including Amazon’s (broken) review/rating system.

1) INK has 11 5-star and 2 4-star reviews (each of which is from a writer or, one, from a writing teacher who said he will now be recommending the book to all his students AND his editors).

2) It was meant as a short, concise, eight things you can easily use right away to give your book a better quality.

3) This was me trying to PAY MONEY to advertise.

4) They admitted all my ads in the past had done very, very well in numbers of sales (I’ve reached the Top 50 on Amazon nearly every time I’ve used them for a promotion).

You want to know how invaluable the Amazon reviewing/rating system is(n’t)? I happened to notice there’d been a new review posted on Black Beast. 3-stars, and here is what the reviewer said:

I would have given it 4 stars if I believed in demon possesion [sp] or ghosts. But it is a very good story. Bobby Mac is a refreshing character. Not your typical detective.

Who buys a FICTION book with stated paranormal elements and then subtracts a star for their own lack of belief in possession of ghosts? I don’t believe in possession either; I simply thought it was an interesting twist to the boilerplate Detective novel.

low-iqI’ll try to draw this all back together. Inconsistency, illogic, lack of integrity, and dearth of intelligence are really on the top of my list of pet peeves (the latter, less so—it’s really not under anyone’s control; we are who we are). But the world just seems to be going crazy and the answer so many times is “grow a thicker skin”. I’m guessing that thicker skin would not have made a difference had the brave teacher in Boulder not removed the suspicious package (pipe bomb) from the school and had it gone off.

I realize it’s apples and enchiladas but it just seems like the crazies, chowderheads, malcontents, agitators, and hooligans (not futbol hooligans; they’re kind of radically cool—check out Green Street Hooligans, a British Indie) are inheriting the earth one bad book, blog, review, and pipe bomb at a time.

And another thing: thick skin is ugly and requires a lot of moisturizer.

A LOT.

Peace.

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The blank page is dead…long live the blank page.

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Rubber Chicken Arrow Through Headv2Author known to use spontaneous satire, sarcasm, and unannounced injections of pith or witticisms which may not be suitable for humorless or otherwise jest-challenged individuals. (Witticisms not guaranteed to be witty, funny, comical, hilarious, clever, scintillating, whimsical, wise, endearing, keen, savvy, sagacious, penetrating, fanciful, or otherwise enjoyable. The Surgeon General has determined through laboratory testing that sarcasm can be dangerous, even in small amounts, and should not be ingested by those who are serious, somber, pensive, weighty, funereal, unsmiling, poker-faced, sober, or pregnant.)

 

 

4 Responses to Even The Mighty Smaug Had A Weak Underbelly

  1. chickletslit says:

    You know how I feel about the “chowderheads” that send a public tweet across Twitter just to “do you the favor of letting you know” they’re unsatisfied with your timeline. Twitter has made it very easy by providing both a DM and “Unfollow” button and I don’t ever mind pointing it out to them. Frankly, I believe one of the reasons we’re seeing more and more of the self-serving, it’s all about me, attitude is the anonymity social media gives – which really then calls into question the core of that person’s personality. There’s a saying I’ve never forgotten (and I’m not quoting verbatim) that a person’s true colors come through when he/she thinks no one is looking. So, if you make a remark, write an email, or leave a review, that comes close to a line where it could appear you’re somewhat of a #*!, then you probably are a #*!. #justsaying

  2. Leslie Moon says:

    Social media at its worst?
    I’m sorry for the ugliness that is experienced because of those who lack a creative thought.
    Keep up the excellent work!!!
    (I wrote a rant comment and deleted it – Ha)

  3. DED says:

    Ha! This is wonderful. I’ve only just now stumbled upon this post, so I shall respond on behalf of the New Podler Review of Books.

    Your scathing criticism of our usage of free stuff is spot on and accepted. But we’re hardly alone in this.

    We have changed the motto since you visited us. It was there from the beginning and was established by the site’s founder, who is no longer with us. I never thought that it was intended to alienate authors whose work was rejected by us. More like, “Here are some indie books that we came across that are good. Obviously, there are more, but [insert lame reason here].” We didn’t get to read “The Martian” or “Wool” when they were indies. Doesn’t mean they sucked.

    I won’t apologize for the lame covers of some of the books on the site. Indie publishing has been plagued with that from the start. Instead, we’ve had a page dedicated to sites where indie authors can find affordable book cover designers.

    Yeah, “Blood Land” was submitted to us via MailChimp, that mass mailing service. I don’t know if you used them or someone did it on your behalf. Regardless, it means that someone didn’t read our submission guidelines. Mystery/Thrillers really aren’t our thing. Maybe one of the available reviewers at the time was into it, but he/she took a pass for whatever reason.

    If you had read our submissions page, at the bottom you would’ve seen this:

    “We reject over 95% of the submissions we receive, and that includes the very good along with the not so good. If you’re rejected, you’re in good company. One author we reviewed posted that he only received five reviews out of 144 submissions to book bloggers. Keep trying!”

    We send out form rejections because it consumes less time, and when managing a slush pile, I like to take the easy route. Kind of like using MailChimp to send out a bunch of submissions to prospective reviewers.

    I’m sorry if the rejection letter that was sent to you hurt your feelings. It wasn’t meant to do that. It was sent to provide closure. Some authors like to have that. Also, I’m sorry that you felt that rejecting your work meant that we thought it was crap. That was not the case. Yeah, the book cover on the site at the time was amateurish, but the writing was not. Judging books by covers…yeah, I know.

    Anyway, I’m sure that you’ve moved on. I hope that this reply clears things up for you. I also hope that when you get rejected, you shrug and move on.

    • rsguthrie says:

      David (DED),

      I don’t know if you’ll see this now that you’ve put The New Podler Review of Books on indefinite hiatus. I’ve not blogged in a year and a half, taking some time off from writing for personal reasons—as you (with Pink Floyd’s superb assistance) pointed out in your well-stated exodus post on TNPRoB, there are only so many minutes, hours, days, etc. before you look up and ten years have got behind you (or, in this case, about eighteen months).

      I felt both obliged and, being me, wont, to write a response to your original comment, even though it’s nearly a year old. I’m actually glad I read your January 9th 2017 final (for now) posting, which among other things did a fine job of summarizing what seems to be one of Life’s nastier curve balls: Podler leaving like Art Model with his Cleveland Browns, under cover of shame and night.

      (Still, the NFL owner was deservedly sans anonymity, which was gravely unfortunate for Model, but having total anonymity was terribly convenient for the tad cowardly Podler.)

      All that aside, my blog was a bit of a knee-jerk reaction, not to any thin skin on my part (I mentioned it stung—implied that if we all admitted the truth, our books are like our babies and negative treatment or implication about said book(s), even for the thick-skinned, of course still affects us on some level).

      My reaction was a combination of surprise (me not having submitted the book to your site), a too-quick perusal of your review site, and one element which I stand by: I did read the most current review and a couple of chapters of the book “chosen” as a small press or self-published “book worth reading”. It wasn’t. And to make certain I wasn’t too close to the situation, I shared the chapters with several quite reliable independent sources and asked for honest critiques—the “sixth grade quality” comment was actually born in the criticism of one of those trusted respondents.

      That said, I reread the blog and I was still more harsh than I should have been, given the events at the time (and particularly, now, with the infamously perfect vision of hindsight, having read the whole of the TNPRoB story). I do apologize.

      I feel your pain in both needing time for your own writing and in having to let something go that clearly matters to you. And, most of the water having long since passed under both our bridges, I will honestly wish you well with your work and, if it should ever come out of cryogenic freeze permanently, your review site.

      Sincerely,

      Rob (R.S.) Guthrie

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